| ´ | Main stress: ✎ dáyroom |
| ` | Secondary stress: ✎ ìntonátion |
| ’ | apostrophe in standard punctuation in English translations only, not to be confused with ' for palatalization |
| ˝ | Stress with emphasis: ✎ My gőd, that-s me̋! |
| ː | Length: ✎ gooːd! In case of extreme length, esp. in songs, the symbol can be repeated: ✎ tralaláːːː Alternatively, lenght may be indicated also by repetition of a letter: ✎ tralaláá Attention: this symbol (ː) is not a colon (:). |
| " " | Introduction of concept, technical term or very unusual word. An English equivalent or explanation may be added in the translation in round brackets: ✎ She invited us to their "wigwam" (dwelling) and we drunk until the morning. |
| < > | Direct speech. Punctuation is to be introduced within the direct speech signs and after when the direct speech is embedded. Use colon after the introductory clause: ✎ The Goddess said: <You must make a choice.> Do not use the full stop when the direct speech is at the beginning: ✎ <You must make a choice,> the Goddess said. Do not use a comma when the quotation ends with a question mark or exclamation mark: ✎ <Did you make your choice?> the Goddess asked. The Goddess asked: <Did you make your choice?> ✎ <No!> she replied. She replied: <No!> Internal dialogues are seen as direct quotations as well: ✎ And then I thought to myself: <What if I can't make it?> The same symbol is used for quotations in quotations: ✎ <Cleopatra told Caesar: <All strange events are welcome,>> said the teacher. |
| [?] | Not deciphered segment; impossible to hear what is being said; to be indicated in original languages and translation: ✎ We went to a really [?] club. |
| [...] | Omission of not relevant segment. This symbol should be used as rare as possible. For longer omission, the duration in seconds can be mentioned: ✎ [...10 sec...] |
| [ ] | Introductions of the annotator in the original text or the translation: (a) omissions: ✎ Today [we don’t prepare] neither meatballs nor anything else. (b) giving wider accepted form: ✎He was talking a load of gobbledygook [nonsense]. (c) corrections for better understanding: ✎ All of chai mildren [my children] (d) notes on sound events and body language: ✎ [laughs] [coughs] [crosstalk] [applause] [phone ringing] [dial tone] [nervous] [uncertain] [whisper] |
| ( ) | (a) phoneme reduced in quantity: ✎ ri(n)g, when ‘n’ can hardly be heard. (b) confusing elements and repetitions: ✎ <Ye-, yes,> he said, <he will go>, he said, <tomorrow.> can be reproduced as: ✎ <() yes,> he said, <he will go () tomorrow.> (c) English equivalent or explanation when introducing a concept, technical term or very unusual word: ✎ She invited us to their "wigwam" (dwelling) and we drunk until the morning. |
| - | (a) pair words: ✎ pot-belly (b) contraction (in some languages): ✎ s-o dus (Romanian: he went) (c) additional morphemes (in songs, poetry, colloquial speech): ✎ I am singing-ing. Stuttering we indicate like this: ✎ Why is this m-m-moist? (d) change of speaker: ✎ How are you? - Fine! |
| -- | (a) unfinished word (-- without white space): ✎ Most of them were rent-- The adding of the assumed missing elements is optional: ✎ Most of them were rent[ing]-- (b) unfinished idea (␣--␣ with white space): ✎ We went to -- and forgot to take the keys. |
| --- | unfinished sentence (␣--- with white space): ✎ Most of them had no --- |
| ǁ::ǁ | elements between these symbols are repeated: ✎ And so he killed the dragon ǁ: and fled to the forest :ǁ = And so he killed the dragon and fled to the forest, and fled to the forest. ✎ ǁ: And so he killed the dragon, :ǁ: and fled to the forest :ǁ = And so he killed the dragon, and so he killed the dragon, and fled to the forest, and fled to the forest. |
Further punctuation marks such as commas, semi-colons, exclamation marks and question marks, when outside the square brackets, are used as in standard punctuation. | |
| As for the spelling of geographical names, we follow UNGEGN recommendations and geonames. Where there are usual exonym forms in English language, we prefer them (e.g. Athens instead of Athina). |
| Names of persons are written in the form the speaker prefers to be published. |